


The Apex

by thebigone



Category: Apex Legends (Video Games)
Genre: Action & Romance, Action/Adventure, F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Other, Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-27
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2019-11-06 10:29:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 20,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17938091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebigone/pseuds/thebigone
Summary: Lifeline gets teamed with Bloodhound in the ring. Can they rise to the top, in and out of the games?[In which I make up a bunch of stuff about the Apex Universe]





	1. Swamps

**Author's Note:**

> My first story. Love the game. Lifeline is my main, and I ship her with Bloodhound. Some other ships likely included if this goes beyond the small story arc I currently have planned. Explicit is the filler rating until I'm sure if I want to add those sorts of scenes. Will also add tags if they become relevant to the development of the story. Thanks for reading! :)

        Dropping swamps was the last thing she wanted to do.  
        But they’d had a third who had been given jumpmaster. Despite her urging, the inexperienced kid hunting for fame and glory, and overconfident because he’d been paired with two prominent Apex stars, had dropped them where he wanted to go anyway. On their maps it was labeled hot, with some of the best loot so early on in the game—the sponsors were all watching, salivating at the chance for another match. Due to the sudden appearance of a giant sea-monster interrupting signals to beacons and cameras throughout the ring, the last two had been postponed. They were thirsty for action, and Lifeline was not ready to give in so easily.  
        There was still something that made her uneasy about the initial slaughter. She liked to drop and get her “sea-legs,” as it were, before she was ready for combat. But she had no choice in the matter—true, she could break off and go her own way, but she was a medic through and through. She would try to keep her squad alive in the chaos waiting down below. And truthfully, she wasn’t _that_ good.  
        The same couldn’t be said for their silent third. Impassive mask staring at them from across the dropship, waiting for the signal, Bloodhound was a star for their ability to survive in the ring on their own, picking off unsuspecting squads even after losing their own and winning solo. It was an amazing feat, she had to admit. But it made the titan of the Apex Games a bit of an imposing sight that she couldn’t stop watching as they waited to hit the island.  
        Her feet hit the ground hard so she slid to soften the blow, shoving open a door into a crumbling shack. People were running everywhere, but she kept eyes on the kid they had in their midst—or, she tried to. He was quick to run the opposite way of she and Bloodhound. She shouted after him to stop, but the din of battle and gunfire was too loud. A bullet zoomed past her head, shaving a few hairs off her left bun, and she continued making her way inside.  
        Luck had a carbine stowed away behind a crate in a corner, and she picked it up and checked the magazine. Full, she was glad to see. She watched Bloodhound wrestle a Wingman from another man’s grasping hands, win, and shoot him twice in the head immediately after. While she didn’t expect the mask to show any emotion, she didn’t imagine the face below was either.  
        Shivering and turning away, knowing that... _thing_ could take care of themself, she turned on her heel to find the kid. Being fired at, she fired back, pegging someone in the shoulder a few times and forcing them behind cover. She took that time to sprint in the direction of their third, hoping he was all right. There were just so _many people_.  
        Well, he wasn’t. She came upon him outside a building in the mud, holding his side, crouched on the ground to avoid the fight. She yanked DOC from her pouch and tapped the two buttons on his side to power him up and instruct him to shield. “Take it easy now,” she drawled softly, as she could see a few tears on his cheeks rolling into the shrubbery below. _Have you ever done this before? How did you get cleared to participate at all?_  
        Questions aside, she worked quickly, searching through her packs for her nano-pen. With the aid of a small shot of tiny nanobots that worked incredibly fast to repair him enough to stand on his own, she managed to pull him up. He limped further into the crawlspace they were tucked into, whimpering. “There ya go,” she cooed, pulling out a few syringes she managed to pick up on her way and dropping them in his shaking hands.  
        “Now you take care o’ that, and we’ll go find Bloo—” on cue, the masked stranger crouched beside them, unseen and unheard until they chose to be. She jumped, scowling at the intrusion. Seeming to be watching their other flank as the kid fumbled to repair himself, their most experienced squadmate said nothing, stoic as ever. Once he seemed ready to stand and fight again, she offered him a hand and dragged him out of the mud.  
        “C’mon now, let’s get some loot and get outta here,” she said it all with a smile, hoping to offer the kid some comfort while he looked so pale.  
        “Th-thanks,” is all she got in reply, but it was really all she needed. As a unit, ducking through continued but waning gunfire, they searched the buildings on the outskirts of the swamps closest to the sheer cliff that marked the edge of the island and the edge of the legal zone. Feeling decently kitted out, the group moved further into the surrounding forestry.  
        It was doomed to fail, their recovery. Suddenly shots were being fired from too far away for them to contest, and while she and Bloodhound knew to duck down until they could ascertain a proper plan, the kid started peeking and firing back. Watching him fall to the ground with a hard thud was painful, her heartbeat jumping to a mile a minute as the bushes behind them began to rustle with more. Drawn to the gunfire like flies, she knew at least one squad lurked in wait for them to turn the other way and start firing. Or for her to start healing.  
        So, with that option out, she and Bloodhound shared a look of understanding (at least she did, hoping that the mask turning briefly her way and nodding almost imperceptibly was sign enough) before they shoved the kid behind the rock where the sniping team couldn’t see him and descended into the bushes. Having each found some holo-armor, arc-stars, a primary weapon, and a few clips worth of ammo, she felt confident that with someone as accomplished as Bloodhound on her side, they could pull through this.  
        The first sign of movement had her throwing an arc-star, flicking the pin to ensure it would detonate. She heard the small _ting_ of it sticking to her target and sighed in relief, backing up in time with her squadmate to avoid the disorienting blast. With two stumbling, eyes watered and ears ringing, she lined up her R-301 while Bloodhound fired their Wingman. The two went down and crawled back. She and the tracker made to follow.  
         _Wait. Two?_ Her gasp gave the hunter only a brief pause as she turned back to see the tail end of a knife across their young friend’s throat. Younger than her, even. Just a child in many respects.  
        It wasn’t as if he was truly dead, of course. This was all a simulation with incredible bodies made purely of shifting nanites inside synthetic polymer skin on metallic frames, their consciousness plugged into the mainframe of the Apex Games so they could direct themselves around this tiny map and dance for the rich sponsors watching. But that didn’t make the death feel less real. She would have to do some serious talking-down once they got him to a respawn beacon—he would definitely need it.  
        Still, she had little time now for any of that. Out in the open to be sniped and taking a nasty shot to the shoulder, she had only one option: shoot the last of this squad in the back and duck for cover again. So that’s what she did, quickly and efficiently. She was moments away from darting out behind the rock and grabbing up the holo-chip that carried her ally’s passcode when she heard more gunfire from behind her. She knew they didn’t have a chance of winning if Bloodhound went down, and she wasn’t sure the situation as she left it allowed the tracker a fair enough fight to be alone for long. So she turned tail without grabbing their new friend, and she didn’t end up coming back.  
        She hadn’t meant to forget him, and truthfully she never would have had the chance to grab him anyway. With two more squads flanking Bloodhound simultaneously, they got caught into a firefight they were barely able to scrape themselves out of. By the time it was said and done, with carnage left about them, she was breathing heavy and desperately fumbling a few scavenged shield-cells into the port on the side of her recently looted armor to repair it—before, if their luck held this way, even _more_ would come to find them.  
        Bloodhound was doing much the same, without the panting or worry she had now. Impassively repairing themself while DOC floated between them, inserting his IVs to heal them up the rest of the way, her last remaining squadmate stared at her—or maybe behind her or to her side, she couldn’t even begin to tell—for any lingering threats while she did much the same. It was then that she realized the kid was long gone, his chances of that fame and glory he wanted so badly dashed until he could re-up for the games next year. If he wanted to—she hoped he didn’t. Or at least that he trained some first.  
        Now the sky was darkening—the games taking a few days to a week to complete fully—and she was stuck with...this. Gesturing to the sky above and receiving a crow perched on the arm, Bloodhound quirked their head at the animal a few times in some strange show of signal before allowing it to lift into the air with a squawk. Then bending to the ground to inspect it, testing the firmness of the damp soil, the tracker looked back her direction and nodded before standing to slink through the brush away from the remains of their firefight.  
        She checked her bag to ensure it had everything she needed and wanted before following quietly. She definitely wasn’t going to argue with the tracker on where they should go, but she would certainly not stop wishing they were a bit more conversational.  
        Her itch to speak grew through the rest of the dusk until the night sky was littered with stars, which Bloodhound would often climb trees to look at before hopping down and adjusting their path. She asked a few times, only to be rebuffed with shrugs or vague gestures, “don’t you have an MRS for that?” until finally she stopped asking altogether. It led her into a pit of boredom she wasn’t sure she could climb out of, and boredom made her anxiety creep in. She wasn’t the most accomplished tracker or fighter like this one—her skillset did not sit in the stillness of the trees, skulking around without a word. She needed some sort of joviality to cling to—something to occupy her rampant thoughts of that kid experiencing death at twenty-two and going home empty-handed for it—or she might just go crazy.  
        Her solution was to hum. Tapping her thigh to a beat she created, she followed the tracker—who fixed her with a slow, stoic gaze when she first started—bopping to her own music with DOC floating nearby in sync. The only other thing she had to occupy her thoughts was the little drone, who was properly tuckered out from all the action earlier and could barely carry himself through the trees as it was, and her own MRS. She checked it occasionally, flicking the screen to the tab that would hold the kid’s banner if she’d just managed to grab the damn chip, but otherwise saw no need to make use of the map there. Bloodhound would take care of that...however they saw fit. She would also take a look at the kill leader’s banner, but it was static—Bloodhound. The mask stared up at her from the device just as impassively as it stared back at her from time to time as they kept pace through the swamplands. It made her shiver, sometimes, the gaze like ice.  
        It was late that Bloodhound finally knelt to test the soil and ran a gloved hand over a nearby tree. They were in a small clearing on ground that didn’t sink when she stepped in it, to her relief, and she was exhausted from the tireless walk the other had put her through. Not exhausted enough, however, to not be dismayed when she discovered that her squadmate intended to camp them _here_ for the night.  
        She thought to protest—shacks were nearby, about five hundred meters from them. They could easily slip inside unseen and hole up there instead of sleeping on the ground out here. But the hunter was already gone—doing what, she had no idea. So she sat on a rock and she waited.  
        Bloodhound was a beast of efficiency, she came to find. They returned with a stack of wood and two rabbits. She’d never even noticed that there was game on the island, let alone anything edible. But apparently the tracker was not in the mood for their pilfered rations, and the way her stomach growled at the notion of freshly cooked meat promised her that she wasn’t either. _Well, a shack wouldn’t let us have the fire to cook those, I guess…_  
        So she bit her tongue as her ally went to work. Seamlessly cutting, stacking, and lighting the wood, it was barely any time at all before two skinned rabbits were staked and roasting above the fire. She wondered if she was going to glimpse the face below the mask when it came time to eat, but she stayed quiet aside from her humming, not intending to ask.  
        Still, the cooking was slow-going—a big fire would cook faster, but would also mean noticeable smoke, and noticeable smoke would get them killed—and her nerves were fraying. The silence was so _loud_ , ringing in her ears louder and louder with each passing minute. Not to mention the mask staring at her across from the fire, dancing with shadows that made it look positively evil in the night. On top of that, the crow was perched on the hunter’s shoulder again, and it too was staring her down like she was guilty of some horrible crime.  
        She began tapping on DOC’s sleeping back with her spare drumsticks to occupy herself, recreating her small beat from earlier, but it was hardly enough. She was still being watched by the animal and its master, and the gazes felt like they were burning holes into her skin. The crow waggled its head from side to side to get a better picture of her and squawked loudly in her direction—and that was the tipping point. Aiming her drumstick at the creature’s feet, she threw it, intending for it to hit Bloodhound’s shoulder and make the damn thing fly away.  
        With a _plink_ , the wood bounced off the holo-armor to the ground below, and the crow did start flapping and making a ruckus at having been attacked. But it quickly readjusted itself to the other shoulder and began to preen. The mask continued to stare her down in the bird’s stead, and she couldn’t take it anymore.  
        “Well are ya lookin’ at me den?!”  
        “No.” The response was so simple it took her off-guard—partially because she hadn’t expected Bloodhound to speak at all and partially because she had expected some sort of chiding for her scaring the crow.  
        When nothing followed the single-syllable response, her agitation spiked, but she said no more. Almost in protest, she vowed to remain silent the rest of the night, grabbing up her drumstick and rapping on DOC harder than before; she watched Bloodhound and the crow watch her until it was time to eat.  
        She took her rabbit and started to nibble, but Bloodhound didn’t partake. Simply setting the other aside, they stood to patrol the area for a small while as she began to scarf hers down. Food helped with her irritation at least, though she felt bad at the idea of the kid at home watching them eat cooked food, still in the running to win, while he nursed his psychological wounds. Thinking on that, she hardly noticed the tracker kneel at her side.  
        “Sleep now. I will take first watch.” The most she’d ever heard from them, she was stunned again. She gave only a small nod of assent, looking down at her picked-clean rabbit, before setting up her bedroll near the embers of the snuffed fire and drifting off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MRS: Mobile Resource Sensor. Just a name I made up for the little thing you see when you pick up a squad banner. If it has a real name, lemme know so I can change it!  
> Thanks for reading! :)


	2. Relay

        It was all she could do not to cry out in surprise at that mask lurking above her in the dark. Her mind quickly connected the dots—Bloodhound had first watch and now it was her turn. They were just waking her to get some sleep for themself. She sighed in relief at the realization the two of them were _not_ being ambushed in the night, and even more worrisome of a thought, they were _not_ turning on her and intending to find glory alone.  
        She sat up slowly, feeling achy as she always did sleeping during the games. The rest was never truly just rest. How could it be? They were in a warzone, at risk of virtual death and dismemberment as real as it would be had she walked in here with her own body. The pain was indescribable and unforgettable, and she always had to take a long break from her usual duties when she returned home from any game in which death happened upon _her_. An unfortunate side-effect of her desire to compete for the winnings.  
        Snapping on a new pair of latex gloves and finding comfort in the familiar way they stuck to her sweaty palms, she stood to take a small walk around the area—briefly, she allowed her eyes to drift to her ally, lying down on their back in full garb to...sleep, she would guess. With that mask? She couldn’t imagine it herself.  
        Once her patrol found no sign of disturbances in their area, she came to settle on her bedroll again. She took the time in the low light of the moons above to clean her gun; reloading it, setting its safety on, and sighing when she found the night was still only a half-hour in. She figured five hours seemed about right, as that’s how long Bloodhound had allowed her to sleep. Their start would be late into the next morning, but that was likely for the best. The other squads would have been moving for maybe an hour or two more than them, and that would give Bloodhound plenty of opportunities to find tracks.  
        Or whatever it was they did. She’d never had the hunter in her squad before—she didn’t think it was often the repeat champions were teamed together. She knew of the others, vaguely, who found excess fame in just how good they were at the games. Makoa she had met before, and she found his charm fantastic. A boisterous person, with a heart she could almost see on his sleeve, she’d had the pleasure of drinking with him exactly twice. The others she knew less and less of, and she figured that had to be purposeful. Would it truly be a show the sponsors enjoyed watching if Bangalore, Wraith, and Gibraltar were pitted against first- and second-timers? The game would likely end as quickly as it began.  
        But perhaps that was not the intention of the matchmaking at all. Perhaps it was all truly so random that it was possible, just very unlikely thanks to the sheer volume of players. And she got lucky enough—or unlucky enough, in some respects—to have the best of the best on her squad. While she was certain after the events of the day before that it would take quite a lot for them to lose this, she was doomed to a dull game of following Bloodhound about like a lost puppy.  
        Puppy. She snorted, thinking of Bloodhound’s name and wondering what they were like when they were younger. If they ever were. It was an intrusive and silly thought—after all, there was only skin or metal under that mask. Even if Bloodhound was an android of some sort, like the other famous Apex Legend Pathfinder, they would have started as a prototype. Though, she had to admit, in that case they would never have been small and unassuming, toddling around as she could barely remember herself doing.  
        It hurt to think of any part of her childhood, so she occupied her hands again with this or that. Still, the thought of her parents and their activities was cutting into her each time she tried to distract herself now that she’d let it in; it led to her jumping and leveling her gun at even the slightest rustle in the damp brush around them. Then it would just be a four-tongued toad or a prismatic beetle, and she would sigh and set the weapon aside.  
        She didn’t know when this would end. When she would feel less empty. She hated the nights here on this lonely island—her thoughts inevitably ran wild in all the wrong ways. She couldn’t stop them, no control of where they took her. She tried to, always tried to, but her parents would creep back in just like they always did.  
        It wasn’t enough. It never was enough, what she was doing. How much money she could send to the Frontier Corps and how much time she could donate between games; how could it ever make up for all her parents did to the Frontier during the Titan Wars? _Maybe one day_ , she always thought, _maybe one day I’ll find a way to make it right_.  
        She mused on and off about when she would feel better about her past for roughly three hours before her reflection was cut in half by a voice, “Do not let your thoughts rule you, felagi. You must be sharp today.” Again her gun was leveled at the intrusion, but this time the barrel was pointed at Bloodhound. Having sat up without her noticing, the hunter stared back at her, posture too relaxed to be sitting on the wrong end of a gun. Still, she quickly lowered her weapon with a shaky sigh of relief.  
        “Ya gotta stop scarin’ me dat way, or I might jus’ shoot ya.” She wiped sweat from her brow, glancing at her MRS in confusion. “Why are ya up so early?”  
        Only a finger to the mask, at about lip-height, was her answer. She obliged the command, quieting and straining to hear whatever it was Bloodhound had caught wind of. _In their sleep. Maybe they ain’t human_. The hunter rose from sitting to a crouch, beckoning her to follow as they slipped into the brush nearby. She didn’t protest, crouching her way to their side and waiting for whatever it was their honed instincts were sensing to happen by.  
        A squad, it sounded like. The footsteps soon became clear as day, but it took long enough that she just had to marvel at Bloodhound’s hearing. _How?_ is all she could think, barely resisting gaping at the back of the hunter’s mask like a fish out of water. _How did you hear them?_ But soon the three broke into the clearing, inspecting the remains of the fire and her abandoned bedroll. “Long gone,” one said to the others. “Probably went back the way we came.”  
        She hadn’t noticed it until one of the other members of the squad knelt beside Bloodhound’s bag and started looting, but the hunter seemed to forget their belongings. Most of them, anyway. The wingman sat in their hands, held firmly at their side, and she wordlessly pulled her carbine off her back to be ready to engage.  
        A low whistle suddenly came from her squadmate, and she looked at them in shock— _are they giving away our position? Why?_ —but it seemed none of the other squad noticed as they passed around shield-cells and nibbled at the remains of Bloodhound’s half-eaten rabbit. They did notice, however, the loud _caw!_ above them just before the crow descended to peck and scratch furiously at one of the enemy’s eyes and face.  
        As the other two quickly moved to help, Bloodhound stood. Amidst the cursing and scuffling the crow caused, she and the hunter went unnoticed until it was far too late, shooting the two bird-less squadmates down. As Bloodhound moved forward to stick a knife into one of them, she dropped the last, carefully avoiding the crow—but not without having briefly thought about it. Still, the animal more than made up for the unsolicited staring contest of last night, and as it descended upon the shoulder of her ally after the corpses all dropped to the forest floor, she had the urge to thank it. _Maybe it will be more of a talker than Bloodhound_. She barely resisted snorting.  
        “You did well, felagi,” Bloodhound murmured low to the animal perched on their forearm. The crow cooed and preened in response. “And you also,” Bloodhound turned their impassive mask to her for the small praise, and she couldn’t help the swell of pride she felt at that. She _had_ done all right. Her aim was on point, at least.  
        “Tanks. You and da crow did most da work,” she said, kneeling to inspect the belongings of the pecked body at her feet.  
        “Raven,” the tracker corrected her.  
        She hesitated a moment, looking over at them and the bird briefly. While she didn’t even know if there was a difference between the two, it seemed to them there was. “Raven.” She nodded, and the hunter bowed their head in return.  
        The cro—raven took flight above them as they looted, circling overhead before flying roughly northwest. Bloodhound followed the animal, and she followed Bloodhound. It wasn’t long before her aching desire for companionship had her pulling out DOC so the drone could buzz lazily beside her as they made their way, finally, out of the swamps. Not that their marshy surroundings changed that drastically as they entered the wetlands.  
        Most of the area seemed to be picked clean, though she and Bloodhound still inspected it thoroughly. She watched the tracker work, when she could—maybe she could glean something from them. But they seemed to just go about things how anyone else would—looking this way and that, searching crates. How did they do what they did so well?  
        It wasn’t until they were making their way toward the nearby redeploy balloon that Bloodhound stiffened. “Our enemies have been this way,” they said, voice nearly taken by the harsh winds that had beset the pair. She was shivering all this while, clutching DOC close so his internal processors could keep her warm. She’d just been contemplating the sheer cost of the terraforming that had to have taken place on this island when Bloodhound’s warning snapped her from her thoughts.  
        “Here?”  
        The tracker only pointed in response to the balloon they were trying to reach. Contrails, barely visible, streaked the sky from the top of it, heading directly north.  
        “Thinkin’ we follow?” She didn’t realize until the distance between them was almost too much for her to continue speaking at a normal volume that Bloodhound was running toward the balloon. While the hunter didn’t answer her with words, their actions were more than enough. She stopped to power down DOC and tuck him back in her bag, holster her weapon, and sprint to catch up.  
        They redeployed seamlessly, landing on top of a small water-reservoir and settling to a crouch behind a respawn beacon. Her mind turned to the kid they dropped with, and again she hoped he was doing all right.  
        They had little time for that, though, as she caught movement in one of the windows of the buildings littering the area. “There,” she murmured, pointing. The hunter nodded in return, creeping forward into a slide down the hill to get next to the building. Bloodhound took point as they kept themselves pressed to the wall, and she made sure their behind was covered well. Finally they made it to an opened door, and the general rustle of unsuspecting looters drifted through the portal to them.  
        “Allfather give me sight,” Bloodhound murmured, and she suddenly could _see_ the enemy. It nearly made her gasp in shock at the after-images, hazy red silhouettes of three people gathered around a crate upstairs, almost perfectly above them.  
        “Did you hear that?” one of them said to the others, too loud. They saw and heard that too? She looked to Bloodhound, a mixture of alarmed and awed. _What is that tech? Is that even legal in the games?_ She didn’t have much more time to muse on her partner, however, as they began to slink inside. She followed as they took position beneath the staircase, and they waited for the entire squad to come down before opening fire.  
        This squad proved a challenge. Prepared for a fight and noticeably better geared, they were immediately greeted with an arc-star. It stuck to her person, and she cursed. “Go, it’s on me!” she shouted at Bloodhound, ensuring the hunter was nowhere near her as she backed into a corner.  
        The concussive blast and tingle of electricity under her skin was always more than disorienting. Horribly painful and making her eyesight a white-gray buzz, like the ancient televisions she’d seen that had lost signal, she hated the sea-sick feeling they brought her. Her hands grasped desperately for a wall, and she thankfully found purchase as she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to shake her ears clear of the ringing.  
        She was being shot. The impact was still forceful, though the bullets were eaten by her holo-shield. For a while, of course. It soon crackled and dissipated audibly, the frame hanging uselessly on her body as the cells deteriorated. The bullets hit _her_ then, and that was even worse. She keened in pain as one hit a tender spot on her ribcage—but then they stopped. Still being fired, she could hear. Why did they stop?  
        She looked up, finally able to see again. She had stumbled to the opposite wall and one of the other squad lie on the ground in the corner diagonal from her. The other two had guns leveled in her direction, but directly between them was Bloodhound. With armor just as broken as hers, they were sponging the bullets anyway, firing back. Just as their wingman _clicked_ to signal the chamber was empty, Bloodhound fell.  
        Her heart hammered into her throat then, adrenaline shooting through her system like ice. She had to pull through this, and that meant she had to think fast. She just didn’t have the skill to duel these two, especially not when that was _definitely_ a devotion, almost finished winding up, in her face.  
        She fumbled with her bandolier for a frag—two, she had two. An idea came then, and she hoped desperately it worked. She pulled the pins on both and threw one only half a meter in front of Bloodhound, who was moving to the side to nurse their wounds. Then she threw the other at the team. With little time before they detonated, she scrambled to her downed teammate and all but slammed on DOC to get him going. She sighed heavily as the other squad quickly darted out the door to avoid the frags, DOC’s shield absorbing the blast that would have killed her and her ally both otherwise.  
        She had never worked faster on patching someone up, and the relief that flooded her system when Bloodhound was standing again nearly made her collapse. But no time for that—she tapped another button on DOC and pushed him behind the staircase so Bloodhound could collect themself, sprinting for the doorway.  
        She hadn’t expected the team to be coming back in, and she took another shot that made her cry out. She could hear Bloodhound making a move to come back to the confrontation, but she knew that might spell disaster—she wouldn’t be able to pull that trick a second time. So she had to make sure Bloodhound saw no reason to return, and that was by taking down the enemies herself.  
        Her thoughts cleared and her body moved on instinct, taking aim down her sights and firing. She took more hits doing it, and felt near to collapsing, but the small choke the team found themselves in allowed her R-301 to go to town. The devotion, scary as it was, didn’t have the chance to wind up enough. They dropped to the floor, and then so did she.  
        Panting with relief, leaning back against the open door, all she could do was look at Bloodhound. The tracker crouched again, seeing the battle over, and nodded to her. She nodded back, no words able to scrape out through her dry throat. They’d _won_. She felt suddenly giddy, though her body still refused to move from its spot. It was so close, but they pulled through. And she felt responsible for it, whereas most other engages had been Bloodhound almost entirely carrying her on their back.  
        She was glad to return the favor—the mask showed no emotion, but the slack in their shoulders told her Bloodhound was glad she did as well. She finally found the strength to all but crawl to DOC, who attached an IV to her arm just as he detached one from her fully healed teammate. Bloodhound dragged the last two bodies inside, shutting the door before crouching over them. Snapping off the blue-tinged armor frames their enemies would no longer need, they threw one to her. She gratefully popped it on in place of her own, pulling out a shield cell to plug it in and start replenishing the holo-tech.  
        With nothing else to do, she just watched Bloodhound loot. It was with grace the hunter respectfully arranged the bodies before taking more from them, and she liked that. She would often close the eyes of the dead if she had the chance—though it was extremely rare she ever did. She liked to see similar respect taken by her ally.  
        Bloodhound flipped a pilfered peacekeeper about in their hands, testing its weight before holstering it and going about loading their wingman and repairing their shields. Then the hunter stood, looking out the window nearby them to watch for threats as she took her turn. An EVA, she liked those. She slung it onto her back, grabbed up a few more items, and opened the door to make her way outside. The sun was just starting to wane from its highest position, and there were many places to loot here.  
        “We will stay here tonight, felagi,” the tracker’s voice followed her calmly as she went to zipline across the waterfall to the untouched buildings she saw there. She didn’t have the chance to answer, but she figured they knew she intended to listen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Slower start in these few chapters, will begin picking up later. Now just wanting to focus on character development and getting my bearings on voicing things from Lifeline's perspective. Easier for me than with any other character, judging by my game stats anyway! Thanks for reading! :)


	3. Artillery

        She almost missed swamps. Sleep—real, appreciable rest that would improve her performance in the games tomorrow—felt impossible. The loud rushing water would fool her slumbering mind into thinking a squad was ambushing them in the night, waking her with a start. Her heart would be pounding, her mind clearing from an almost-nightmare and her senses booting into overdrive. Her fingers would shake and her gun would falter as it made its way to her hands. Then Bloodhound would give her a strange look from their perch nearby her—she figured they were, at least, by the way they cocked their mask at her like a confused puppy—and she would sigh and lie back again. It was nothing short of hell, and after her fourth failed attempt at sleep three hours into her allotted five, she sat up fully, scrubbed her face with her bare hands, and snapped a new pair of gloves on.  
        Pulling her hair neatly back into her buns, she stood and paced a bit to shake out the last of her inexplicable, but lingering, nerves. Bloodhound’s mask followed her back and forth, and she felt the weight of the gaze beneath it like stone bricks tied to her ankles. She decided then to reciprocate, staring back at them as she adjusted her clothes and tried to rid herself of the last of her jitters. They seemed not nearly perturbed as she was, just looking right back for a small while before turning to face the door again for their watch.  
        “I’m up now, ya know,” she said, a hand finding her hip. Talking might calm her, she realized then— _and look who I’m with. Just shoot me now_. “Ya can get some extra rest befo’ we head out.”  
        “I do not like to oversleep,” was the easy reply, accent still unrecognizable to her. She nodded to that, though the gesture went unseen. She continued to stare at Bloodhound as finally she regained enough control of herself to sit by their side. A few respectable feet away, but close enough that she could help watch out the window opposite the door. She did this, for a small while, but her eyes would always find themselves examining the hunter again.  
        A heavy brown coat covered in shining holo-armor, many packs containing who-knows-what, a strange device on their wrist that held dubiously legal technology, and that mask. She tried to figure out something... _anything_ with the information available to her. But the figure was just as mysterious to her, the person trusting her life in them, as they were to anyone else who watched the games. The Apex Legends were no strangers to interviews—she’d had a few herself. She wasn’t one to hog the spotlight as much as some of the others, but she would occasionally talk to the press in hopes of spreading word of the Frontier Corps. That’s not to mention that it helped her to clarify to the world watching _why_ she was involved with the bloodsport. Why she was willing to work with the last remaining Apex Predator, a pardoned war-criminal just as bad as the parents she disowned. Possibly worse. She wanted the people of the Frontier to know she wasn’t one of the rich sponsors, egging on those in the ring to slaughter each other as gruesomely as possible. And she wasn’t one looking for fame or glory or money. She just wanted to help.  
        There was always a pit of worry in her stomach that the common people of the Frontier didn’t believe her. Maybe they didn’t see the interviews she took or maybe they just didn’t care what she had to say—an Apex competitor she was, and that was enough for them. She hoped that wasn’t the case, but how could she blame the disenfranchised everyman of the Frontier, left high and dry after the war?  
        She shook her head again as the thoughts invaded. She needed to _stop_ them. Think of anything else. And Bloodhound wasn’t providing her a distraction through observation. Maybe she could eke _something_ out of them.  
        “Have ya eva taken an interview after a successful game?”  
        The tracker’s mask turned sharply to her, cocking in curiosity again. “No.”  
        “Not even one?”  
        “No.”  
        She hesitated, waiting for something else—hoping they’d picked up on her desire for them to elaborate. But it seemed she still needed to take the lead. “So what do ya play da games fo’? The money?”  
        “No.”  
        She wanted to pluck her eyes out at this point in the conversation, but she had powered through worse. She would persevere and learn something about this mysterious stranger. “Has anyone asked ya what you are under there?”  
        The mask twitched again, and she couldn’t tell if it was confusion or irritation. “What I am?”  
        “I mean, are ya even human?” She had to know at _least_ that about them. Perhaps not their real name, or their intent in coming here, but she needed to know if they were human or android like a few other contenders. Then she could at least mull over what their childhood was like, or where they were raised, or if they were raised by wolves—a possibility she found disconcertingly likely.  
        The mask nodded once. Then, she struck gold. “Why?”  
        They’d asked her a question! It wasn’t a callout in the heat of battle or a strategy beforehand, and it wasn’t another no. She felt like maybe this was the farthest anyone had ever gotten, and she had to pursue it. She could imagine the cameras turning to them, people watching with bated breath to know something, anything, about the faceless hunter. “I gotta put my life in your hands, I guess I just wanna know somethin’ about ya.”  
        Bloodhound took a long pause before speaking again. “We do not need to know anything. Only that we will remain alive. And until our destiny ends, we cannot be killed.”  
        She’d been falling back into thoughts she didn’t want to have, and those words were a welcome snap out of it. But the content in them was lacking, and she gave a weary sigh in response. “Maybe that’s how you see the world through that mask of yours, but it ain’t how I see it. We ain’t got destinies, and we can get killed whenever anyone wants to kill us, if they’re better than us.”  
        “You do not have to see things that way for them to be true,” was the quiet, measured response. If they _were_ irritated with her interrogation, they were more than adept at hiding it. “The Allfather decides when our destinies end.”  
        “What is the Allfather, anyway?”  
        “The arbiter of our destinies. The one who guides us.” She wasn’t raised religiously—she didn’t even know people were anymore. Unless they were raised by wolves. Still an option, she reminded herself.  
        “Well how does he guide you?” She arched her brow at them expectantly. Still hoping to find something to cling to, to occupy her thoughts with.  
        “To my enemies. He gifts me with the sight.”  
        “I thought that thing gave you the sight,” she said, pointing to the device on their wrist. Bloodhound’s mask turned down in the direction of the arm folded lazily over their knee, turning the device this way and that a moment before looking back to her.  
        “This allows me to share my sight. You have seen them. Through feet of stone, their blood pumps for us to see.” She hesitated a long while—long enough for Bloodhound to turn back to their watch as if the conversation was entirely over—before replying to that.  
        “So...you see people...because they got their blood pumpin’?” She couldn’t stop contemplating the implications of that. What technology could that be? Was there an optical augment that had some sort of infrared or thermal sight so potent it allowed the hunter to see through walls? Again, how in the world could that be legal to use in the games? And then the advanced holo-technology involved in creating a device designed to project the static images she saw the day before...did Bloodhound create this tech? Were they a fantastic bio-scientist on top of a renowned big game hunter and Apex champion? She couldn’t imagine they had time for that, but the tech was there on their wrist regardless.  
        An errant thought squirmed into her mind suddenly, alongside with the realization that Bloodhound was _hot_. Extremely warm, even though she was feet apart from them. Radiating heat like a small fire. What if it wasn’t an augment? What if Bloodhound was right and they were god-gifted the ability to see people’s heartbeats? What if they were human, but just barely?  
        That felt silly, but she was grateful for it. Something to think about. She sank into her wild contemplations of the hound really just being a beast of the hunt, parading as a human to fit into society so that they could prey on others. It was silly, like a werewolf fairytale. But it was enough.  
        For a time. Then Bloodhound retired to sleep, standing and heading to the floor below to hide themselves away beneath a staircase, and she was left alone with her thoughts again. At first she could continue distracting herself, but her parents would make their way into the equation time and again. She also thought of the kid they dropped with. Was he watching? Was he angry? Did he hate her for not doing more for him?  
        She couldn’t blame him, she supposed. He died. He’s out there, but he died as real a death as anyone could provide. _How do you come back from that?_  
        At last the sun was inching its way into the sky, and she couldn’t have been happier for it. The moment three hours had passed, she was down below, looking at her ally. Their breathing was even with sleep, she assumed, and she hesitated there, wondering if she should allow them to continue. After all, how good could their rest have been in that mask? Did they sleep at all? Her supernatural thoughts from the night before came to her suddenly, amusing in the light of day. She knelt beside the hunter’s head, poking gently at the side of the mask, then tapping on one of the lenses embedded within it. A slight roll of their head and a sudden intake of breath made her aware she’d woken them, and she grinned down.  
        “Ya lucky. I thought about jus’ takin’ it off for ya.”  
        The hunter paid her little heed, sitting up slowly and holstering their weapons. “You should not. We must move before the ring catches us.” They moved past her lithely, and she turned to track their movements. _You are so…_ She took a few moments to think of a proper word to describe them succinctly. _Strange._  
        “Why not?” she fired back, grabbing out some rations to eat gingerly as they gathered the last of their things to continue on. “Ya must be a special kinda hideous to think I ain’t seen worse.”  
        Bloodhound took point as they exited the building, following the cliff face beside them toward the large artillery bunker nearby. She knew there was always at least one squad there, and she quickly finished her bit of food and kept her gun out in order to be prepared. After a long lull in their conversation, “We have both seen worse.”  
        The way Bloodhound was able to duck out of answering her question so elegantly was bordering on infuriating. The ring was closing quickly, and the stakes were climbing, and they still wanted to sprinkle her with little riddles? She realized her terrible sleep and even worse watch shift was making her unfair, but she paid that little mind. “You—!”  
        “Shh.” She started as Bloodhound held an arm out, stopping her from walking past them as they bent to touch the soil. After sifting it briefly in their hands, they stood and turned toward the large wall that separated artillery from the area surrounding it. “Come. Prey.” They started sprinting, leaving her in the dust as she still tried to collect her thoughts.  
        She could keep pace with them, but now the gap between the two of them was unnerving. She didn’t want to get caught out with Bloodhound so far, and so single-mindedly focused on following whatever they’d caught wind of. “Slow down, ya damn dog!” she called angrily, hoping that would get her point across. “I can’t keep up wit’ ya!”  
        They growled at her then—it was sudden and made her blood run cold, the animalistic sound that came from them. “Keep _quiet_! You’ll scare them. If we let them outpace us, they have the upper hand!” She watched them flip open the device on their wrist, growl again—deeper, more primal, and much more frightening—and then they ran. Far faster than she could hope to keep up with, Bloodhound disappeared past the fences and buildings that made up the outside of artillery into the heart of it.  
        She could still hear, from a ways away, the breathing. The labored snarling like a wild animal as they sought their prey. She was confident, in that moment, they would find it—or it would find them if they stayed that loud. She was proven right as she turned the corner to see Bloodhound in a firefight with at least six other people gathered around. Dammit.  
        She aimed down her sights to line up shots as best she could, too far away to get in the mix otherwise. Bloodhound dodged, weaved, and shook almost the whole bunker with the way they growled. She was helping, connecting, but it was far too chaotic for her to commit to anything other than suppressing fire to peel for her ally. She watched them move with speed and agility she could barely comprehend to pounce on anyone that took themselves too far out of position—sometimes shooting them, and other times just stabbing them in the neck with a dagger. It was amazing and terrifying all at once, and the battle passed in a blur of her mostly trying not to shoot Bloodhound. Then things were silent. Only they remained.  
        The mask stared at her, the body beneath it heaving with each intake of breath, exhaling in a shaky growl. She felt rooted to the spot by the power there, and she wondered vaguely if she was about to be added to the killcount in the midst of what she could only identify as absolute bloodlust.  
        She leveled her weapon at them to be sure that didn’t happen. They didn’t respond in kind, but the mask didn’t leave her. She felt exposed, standing in the middle of the open with bodies piled around them and Bloodhound looking more enemy than friend. She swallowed, her heart hammering in her ears, and wondered if they could smell her fear like an animal could.  
        It was a swift transition from the beast that Bloodhound became to the person they usually were. The growling faded, their breathing regained normalcy, and they turned their sight from her to begin honoring the fallen around them. Feeling as if she’d just been dismissed, she slowly came closer to do the same.  
        It was wordlessly that they looted and just as wordlessly that they made their way out of artillery and into the woods southward. Once the automated announcer came over the intercom to warn them of a care package dropping, she checked her map to see its location. They were close to the ring and to the package. She wondered if they could make it in time, and turned to ask, but...couldn’t get the words out. Seeing the hunter again made her heart jump to her throat a mile a minute—their gaze snapped sharply to her as it did, and that only made it worse.  
        Hours passed this way, with her mind replaying what had happened and trying to rationalize. People get augments all the time, she would tell herself. But those people were wealthy, and usually pilots. Pilots were a whole other league of human. They would decimate the games if they decided to play. _Was Bloodhound a pilot? If so, what side were they on?_ That was a worrisome thought that she couldn’t shake.  
        When Bloodhound stopped suddenly at a small plateau with a shade of trees, she nearly ran into their back. She just barely stopped herself, looking up at them and feeling her heart race again. And again, they looked to her. “We will stop here to rest.”  
        She nodded and just sat down, pulling the drone out to hug it tightly. Its warmth was a deep, calming comfort, and after a few moments of sitting across the tracker, she finally got the courage to speak again. “Why do ya wear that?”  
        The mask in question quirked in thought. It took a long time for Bloodhound to respond, and all the while she could only wonder which version of their muffled voice she would get. But they were calm as ever. It seemed as if artillery had never happened. “If your destiny was meant to end here, by my hand, would you rather you knew my face?”  
        Her mind quickly conjured images of hooded death, or masked headsmen—and that only elicited a shiver from her. _Is that how you see yourself? An executioner?_ She didn’t want to give them any leeway, however, so she nodded defiantly. “Yeah. I would.”  
        The mask stared back at her for a very long time. Long enough for her to finally look away, down at the nameless pack of buildings below them—a last stop before cascades, one of the few areas of the map still in the next viable ring. She even had time to check her MRS—four squads left.  
        “Perhaps one day you will.” She glanced up in surprise at the hunter, who was looking away from her now. “And you may come to regret it.”  
        She could feel a frown of consternation pulling at her features, but even deeper, she was just tired. She didn’t, for once, want to continue the conversation as it was. Not if Bloodhound was just going to prognosticate at her with that eerily calm voice of theirs. She moved her eyes to a LED banner nearby them—Bloodhound stared back at her there, too. _No escaping that mask._  
        She closed her eyes a while, pleased to find that Bloodhound would allow her to do so, and cleared her mind for as long as their brief respite allowed.


	4. Cascades

        That small rest was well needed. The time to clear her mind of her thoughts allowed her to focus. Shaking off the lingering trepidation at the sight of Bloodhound’s... _episode_ let her see the hunter in an appreciable light again. They were doing all they could to win despite the odds stacked against the two of them—and whatever their past or current motivations, she needed to be grateful they were on her side. She’d have surely been slain by now otherwise. Likely by them.  
        “All right felagi,” she said, standing and stretching—hoping they didn’t mind her butchering the word. “Where we goin’?”  
        “The ring will be at its smallest soon. We move inward, felagi.” Bloodhound’s responding in kind made her smile. _We can do this. Stop looking at everything so negative, Ajay._ She pulled the drone out from her backpack so he could follow her along, moving ahead of the hunter so she could take point. A relief from looking at them she might need to keep her upbeat attitude.  
        While she doubted the formation would last, she was happy to have things this way for the time being. A beat started up in her head and she began to sway to it. Only four left. They could very well win this. Excitement made her heartbeat climb, and she purposely avoided thinking about what that meant in relation to her partner. She kept her eyes and ears open properly, but her thoughts would wander from time to time to the relief she would feel once this game ended.  
        Finally they reached the small crop of buildings they saw from their cliff perch and she nodded to them so Bloodhound would know her intention before making her way, still dancing, inside to check for loot. A phoenix kit sat waiting in a corner—then another. How lucky, meant for them. _Put here by the Allfather_ , she could imagine her hunter saying. She snorted at the voice in her mind—but then snapped to attention as she heard it cry out nearby.  
        “Andskoti!” She heard them groan in pain as they quickly dipped into her building, slamming the door shut behind them and dashing up the stairs to her. Blood oozed from wounds on their shoulder, and Bloodhound fell back beside a crate. She looked out the window, gun immediately in her hands. “On the ridge, far. Snipers,” the tracker breathed.  
        She slid to the window beside them to see the team. Their forms were small, but moving closer. “Go on now,” she whispered, turning her attention to her bleeding teammate. “Stay still. Patch yo’self up a bit, I’mma go downstairs and wait for ‘em.” She pushed the drone to their side and flipped him on. Nodding agreement to her own plan and dropping a few shield cells to Bloodhound’s feet, she crouched her way down the staircase to do as promised.  
        Bloodhound was able to repair themself in time for the team to come crashing into their small bunker. The fighting was shockingly quick, as they had no time to make mistakes now. At this stage of the game, with everyone lurking closer in the small ring, the sound of combat drew players like flies. They had to be quick to survive—and they were. The squad was soon cut down, and she worked alongside Bloodhound as fast as she could to gather what they would need and run.  
        The hunter found tracks nearby, and fresh. With the two of them still licking wounds, Bloodhound dismissed them and led them elsewhere, circling the edges of the cascades to scout a good place to rest. Bloodhound refused every house and shack she suggested, stating tracks were far too close. Finally, they turned her attention to a tree nearby. A large one with a hollow hidden in the trunk by the closeness of other trees. “This will be where we lay our heads tonight,” the hunter told her, slipping inside to sit against the far inner wall.  
        She hesitated, but she wouldn’t start a mutiny this late in the game—she slipped inside to sit beside them, looking out at the dusky buildings in the cascades below. They’d fight there the next day, where the ring was narrowing. And hopefully they would win. “Sleep, felagi. I will watch over you.”  
        She was far too cramped, sitting up beside them this way, to do as they bid. So she had one real option, and truthfully, she was too tired to protest it. She angled her body to lean her head on Bloodhound’s shoulder, and she hugged the warm drone to her chest to fall asleep. She managed it, eventually—listening to the even breathing of the person beside her.  
        “Felagi, it is time to wake.” Her eyes snapped open, having been in an uneasy and uncomfortable sleep anyway. There was a flash of something white in her peripheral. _Maybe I’m still too tired to know what I’m seeing, but that was...a hand. Pale skin._  
        The hand was gloved the next time she saw it, and she decided that she likely didn’t see what she thought at all. Wiping her eyes of sleep and sitting up to put new gloves on and fix her hair out of her eyes, she watched Bloodhound settle down for their rest. Propped straight with hands folded over their stomach, the hunter stilled. For a while, they had her fooled—daydreaming and keeping watch through their small bark-framed window out onto the island surrounding them, she took maybe an hour before she realized Bloodhound was still well awake. Breathing not evened in sleep, mask still turning this way and that.  
        “Ya need ta sleep. C’mon now, lay ya head down.” She proffered her lap, leaning back and patting it gently. She wouldn’t allow them to be tired the last day of the games, and so she would not take no for an answer. But after a long pause, it seemed no refusal was coming. With just a nod, the hunter slowly leaned to the side, falling into her lap with the mask turned upward. She looked down at it, unsure of where to put her hands once Bloodhound occupied their previous resting place. Finally, one hand went to their forearm to pick absently at a bare thread on the coat covering it, and the other rested on top of the drone now leaned into her side. With two warm bodies pressed into her, it was hard not to fall asleep again.  
        Only the sound of the announcer telling her there were two squads left kept her from lolling out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters, one update. The previous was turning into a monster, so I split it up into a big-ish one and a baby chapter. This game is almost through! Thanks for reading! :)


	5. Watchtower

        The giddiness of winning was beginning to infect her. As she waited, Bloodhound sleeping on her lap and the drone powered down and charging against her side, she could barely contain it. They were going to win! Not only was it against all the odds, but it was going to be in especially record time. The games usually went at least another few days, but tomorrow she was certain Bloodhound would lead them to victory. She would get her payout and she could go home—wherever she made her home for the next few months before she was queued again, of course. Then it would all start over.  
        But this time had been so different; so real. With just the two of them struggling against the odds, and Bloodhound showing her what a real Apex Legend looked like, the experience was raw and powerful. She’d never felt it this way before, and she wondered if this was how the hunter experienced it every time. If so, perhaps she could see their attraction to the sport—if, as they said, money and fame weren’t the reasons they stayed.  
        It was hard to restrain herself from bouncing about in joy as the sun crested the horizon and set long shadows down over cascades. The ring would be closing in only an hour, and Bloodhound was due to wake up any moment.  
        Almost on cue, before she could do the honors, the hunter stirred in her lap. Quickly rising from their lying position, they holstered their weapons and crouched lithely out of the trunk they’d made their home in. She followed suit, eager to get moving. “This ends today, felagi,” Bloodhound murmured to her as they tested the grass and the trees for tracks. Or...clues. Or whatever they did.  
        “Ya excited?” she chirped, unable to contain that she herself was.  
        “No.”  
        Nope! She would not let that get to her. She wouldn’t even ask.  
        After righting themselves and feeling properly prepared, they nodded to one another and skulked their way across the cliffs above cascades. Being that the area was in a watery pit overlooked by the northern river watchtower, she could feel the shared trepidation they had about going to the lowground to be shot like fish in a barrel.  
        “There,” the hunter pointed to the jutting metal structure above, finger tracing a zipline that disappeared directly upward inside of it. “We must take the high position before they do. That is our only chance.”  
        “All right,” she responded, and that was all it took for Bloodhound to holster their weapon and begin a steady jog in that direction. She followed suit, feeling nervousness start to creep up her spine. Like icy tendrils snaking through her insides, it made every swaying brush or LED banner look like an enemy, and she could barely stop herself from jumping each time she caught movement in her peripheral. It was a relief when they began their ascent. She felt much less exposed when crouched behind the panels and antennas that made up the very top of the tower. Bloodhound trusted her to watch their backs while they kept point, and she was all too happy to oblige.  
        Hours passed with them sitting in the rising sun. Neither spoke, though she could hear their breathing just beside her. Feel their warmth—almost overbearing with the sun beating down on them as well. The anticipation was building to a thrumming tenseness in her fingers, making her toes curl and her stomach twist from one side of her body to the other. She was hungry, thirsty, and sweaty all at once—but no matter how much her instincts insisted she do something about one or all of these problems, she had to stay still and wait.  
        Finally, Bloodhound nudged her. “There,” the hunter whispered, barely audible through the mask. She turned on her heel to follow their gesturing hand, watching three little ants dart across cascades to settle into the second smallest ring. She checked her MRS then—the two of them weren’t inside it.  
        “We will have to move,” Bloodhound said, shifting their gun in their hands.  
        “We don’ stand a chance if they see us,” she countered, and the silence that followed made her sure they knew she was right.  
        “Regardless of that, we cannot stay here.” The hunter looked at their things briefly. She watched them rifle through ammunition before checking the magazines of their guns. Satisfied, they slung their bag on their back and began to move toward the staircase that would lead them back to the zipline. A well timed _ping_ from her MRS drew her eyes away from her retreating ally, and she grinned down at the notification looking back at her.  
        “I got an idea,” she said, turning to stare down the mask that was now watching her. She flashed her device in their direction. “I can call in a package, down there.” She flicked her thumb over her shoulder to indicate the small clearing between the base of the tower and the buildings below. “They’ll come to it, and we can fire down once they’re close.”  
        The hunter paused in consideration, the mask looking back at her, unblinking and impassive as ever. Her heart hammered in her chest, hoping they would approve. It seemed the most viable strategy. What if they refused? Did she follow them to what she felt might be certain death? She knew she would have to. They wouldn’t stand a chance split up—even less than what they would stand if they made the wrong move together. Still, they would never make it into the ring without being fired upon, they both knew that.  
        Finally, Bloodhound slowly made their way back to her side, giving her a terse nod. The tension flooded from her limbs and she fumbled with the MRS, nearly dropping it in her relief. Typing in coordinates, double-checking to make sure she was calling the package in the right place, she finally sent in the order. The nearby alarms blared as a holo-beacon lit up the sky, showing the intended dropzone as exactly where she wanted it. She hadn’t realized she was holding in a breath, but she let it go then, looking to her ally.  
        The mask was facing her, though it swiftly looked away at the sound of splashing below. They were far still, but the other team was doing exactly as she had hoped for. Her eyes traced their movements as they closed the distance. The announcer reminded them of the ring closing in only two minutes. Her heart was in her ears, making them ring—making the hand clutching a grenade shake. This was it. They had to make this count. It was the other team or it was them.  
         _You can do this._  
        One minute until the ring began moving. The team was plodding steadily along, jumping fences and climbing bridges. But they were still so far. Would they even make it to the package? Did they have a backup plan? No, she hadn’t thought of that. Why didn’t she think of that?  
         _You can do this._  
        Thirty seconds left. They were closing in. How long did they wait? Until the other team opened the package? Until they started moving away? Sooner? The questions backed up in her throat, making her unable to even whisper one of them.  
         _We can do this._  
         _Bang!_ It was Bloodhound who fired first. A shot connected and immediately made one of the enemy duck for cover to nurse her wounds. The other two looked about in surprise, and she took that opportunity to throw her arc-star. Instinct kicked in as she watched her growling teammate drop from the precipice to the battle below. They took shots all the way down, but rolled into a crouch and fired back once they struck ground, undeterred.  
        She unholstered her weapon and did the same.  
        The bloodshed was a blur. She was hurting, badly. She could feel the edges of her vision darkening as an entire shot from a mastiff ate straight through her armor and into her person. The pain was staggering, and she was only barely able to level her carbine in time to fend the attacker off—or maybe it was Bloodhound, stabbing them in the neck from behind. She wasn’t sure. The earth seemed to rumble with a deep growl, and she swam in the heat of the moment.  
        Her movements felt jerky and disjointed. She’d been here before, but never at such a stark disadvantage. She was taking fire from behind. Or in front? She wheeled around to fire back. Nothing there. _Where are they?_  
        More shots. Aim, fire. It was all she could do. The smell of blood was heady, coppery. Bloodhound’s growl circled around her, behind a building. She ducked the same way, tracked the enemies as they ran.  
        Then it was over. At their feet was the other squad, puddles of blood slowly dripping into the shallow river water. The banners around them flashed their faces and the nearby speakers blared an upbeat chime. “You are the Apex Champions,” the announcer congratulated them. She looked down at herself, bleeding heavily. She could see bits of synthetic meat showing through her person. A horrific injury if the body were real. _Do they repair these, or just make new ones?_ Her thoughts were fragmented, high.  
        Their victory hit her as the sound of the Apex mainframe powering down started to roar. It brought her back to the moment where before she had been floating—they had thirty more seconds in these bodies and then they would be taken out, given winnings, and free to move on from the experience forever. She looked over at Bloodhound and she whooped, pumping her fist into the air. Jumping. Oh, it _hurt_. The pain bloomed down from her shoulder blade to her pelvis, raw and tearing at her nerves. Her frayed, jittery nerves. But it was still well worth it.  
        “We did it!” She mouthed over the din of the entirety of the island beginning to shut down. Over the music and the pomp and the announcer rambling statistics for the viewers and sponsors to hear.  
        Bloodhound dropped their weapon, coming to her to clasp a warm hand on her arm. Calm and unfazed as always. The voice from within the mask was just as tranquil as ever. “We did well, felagi.”  
        There was a lot she wanted to say as the music grew louder. So many questions she had that would go unanswered if she didn’t blurt them in that moment. But she couldn’t. She was caught, breathless and in wonder, watching the other champion as they pulled away from her. They’d carried this game on their back, and still they congratulated her. It made her feel a deep swell of pride, and she could only smile back.  
        “Hope...hope I don’t see ya on the other side,” she called, jokingly. Five seconds left.  
        “Trust in the Allfather.”  
        And that was the last she heard from them. Waking up was always a confusing experience. Going from standing there beside Bloodhound on the island to, without warning, people bustling around her to unplug her body from the massive machine that made the games possible. IVs pulled, wires tediously unplugged from beneath her skin, medicine given to put her to sleep as her body slowly acclimated to metabolizing at a proper rate again. She was excited to sleep in a bed. To shake off the game. To forget the worst of it and remember the best.  
        The cot and room she was shown to were cold and clinical. Everything smelled sterile. People moved briskly this way and that in the hallway just outside, up and down floors to check on the other four people who needed to be brought back to reality as she did. It was as she was helped into the room by an aide that the sedatives started to make themselves known—her eyelids were drooping before she even crossed the threshold. People were talking at her, around her, and swimming in her vision. She could barely hear them.  
        She dropped like a stone into her bed and fell asleep to dreamy imaginings of Bloodhound in a stark white room, growling and snarling in a corner as nurses tried to remove their mask.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got in a bit of a frenzy to finish this game up. It was at this point the story solidified itself in my head, so I added a few applicable tags. The next few chapters will be a bit transitional and possibly short. But hopefully the updates come pretty quickly to make up for it, as my mind won't let this plot rest. Thanks for reading! :)


	6. Yuma

        “There ya go,” she chimed, offering a weak smile to the child that sat up on the rickety cot she’d managed to scrounge from the haphazard med bay after hers had broken. A small radio droned an upbeat tune—meant to calm herself more than any of her patients. Done with the rigorous vaccinations the kid desperately needed at least two years prior, she put the last bandaid on his upper arm and helped him down. “Ya want a lollipop?” She proffered one from one of her pockets. He wordlessly took it and ran from her, holding back tears, to his waiting mother’s arms just outside her tent. It was a cute display, but it did little to alleviate the mood she’d been in since the game—one she couldn’t even pinpoint the cause of.  
        At first she attributed the overall strangeness of the match to her funk—Bloodhound especially. But overtime, she’d been able to mostly forget all that...so she told herself. Almost convinced herself, even. After all, weird mannerisms and customs aside, they were just another Apex player who found themself to be good at the bloodsport and continued playing to win. She was much the same—she just knew her own reasoning. Maybe Bloodhound had a charity they were sending their winnings to, as well. Who knew?  
        And that was the problem. No one knew. The news floating about the Frontier had been abuzz with the recent against-all-odds win the pair had, and she’d even taken a brief interview. But it had just dissolved into an interrogation about the hunter she had been allied with, and she had no answers to the questions. _‘Who is Bloodhound behind the mask?’ How the hell should I know?_  
        The general public eventually moved on, of course. Another game came to pass the next month and people were excited for it. She understood the need for distraction, but it was hardly helpful in her relief efforts. Her patients would get caught up in listening to and watching the games and just not come in for checkups or shots or treatment. What was she supposed to do? Track them down?  
         _Bloodhound could._ She snorted at the intrusive thought. Well, she wasn’t Bloodhound, was she? So instead she was forced to wait and hope they came in. Make calls and ask around. It was frustrating. Paperwork was mounting. The Frontier Corps was hemorrhaging money in the Yuma system and she was doing all she could to help out—but it wasn’t enough. They were pulling back resources, and so she was left with a few scattered tents, some beds, and medical equipment that was just barely sterile.  
        A grown man took his place on her cot, and she smiled up at him as she searched her list for her next patient file. Pulling him up on her holopad and setting the battered piece of equipment aside, she bopped along to the low beat in her tent as she read. “So...ya been vomitin’ a lot lately, eh?” She glanced up and nodded at the man’s quiet affirmation.  
        She listed an array of symptoms he might also have, checking off each one as he replied yes or no. Starting to formulate a few ideas, she went behind her desk to gather up some equipment—a cuff, a thermometer, a stethoscope. She hooked the scope around her neck and slipped the cuff up his arm. “Just gon’ take ya blood pressure real quick. Listen to your heart and lungs. Then we can maybe find ya some anti-nausea around, and—”  
        “Can we listen to the games?” He glanced anxiously down at her hands as she started to pump the cuff up. “I get really nervous during these kinds of things, and the games calm me down. Please?”  
        She didn’t really want to, it was true—but she nodded anyway. If it made her patient less fidgety and her job easier, how could she deny it? She went over to the nearly decrepit radio and flipped the station to the broadcast of the games. The quality was poor, but that was to be expected anywhere in the Yuma system. The IMC had been too focused on draining the planets dry to really bother with a sturdy communication infrastructure. The crackling voices of the game analysts droned through the tent, and she was able to tune it out for a small while as she worked.  
        She had just gone to her holopad to take a few notes about the patient’s elevated heart rate when she heard the first of it. “...returning champion Bloodhound is making leaps and bounds this game. Traveling with a team of less experienced players, I hope they haven’t gotten soft after having other popular champion Lifeline on their squad last game!”  
        “I hope not as well, Rufus—the competition is tough this year since the increase in the overall prize money, and many people are coming in and playing their absolute best. But that doesn’t seem to be deterring this big game hunter! Their strategy is unwavering, taking them into bunker now where it seems another team lies in wait…”  
        Putting the tablet aside, notes finally taken, she nodded absently to herself and went to her desk in search of something for nausea. It was barely a fix at all, but until she could get in a new shipment of antibiotics, she didn’t think there was much she could do about what she suspected was wrong with the man.  
        “...shots fired! Another squad has actually come up behind Bloodhound’s in the midst of the bunker fight! Sliding down the stairway, it looks like Bloodhound is trying to find some cover. Will they make it in time?”  
        A small packet of tablets found its way into her hands after a long while of idly sifting through the contents of her desk drawer. She stayed there a few moments, listening to the radio crackle into garbled nonsense, and nearly threw the package at it in exasperation. She stayed her hand, however, coming over to give it to her patient instead. “There ya go. That should do for a while. Come back in a week, and hopefully I’ll have somethin’ more for ya then.” When he left, she didn’t call for another.  
        Sighing and settling down behind her desk with her tablet out in front of her, she tried to start typing up an order. Antibiotics, analgesics, antiseptics. They needed so many things that the Frontier Corps likely wouldn’t provide. What was she supposed to do? Start manufacturing the drugs in a tent with a few rocks to bang together?  
        Frustration punched her like a fist to her gut, stress gathering in her temples. She threw the tablet forward, knocking stray papers and pens to the floor at her feet—only amplifying her anger, not relieving it. She stood to start pacing, feeling jittery. Her fingers shook with nerves. What was she supposed to do? She couldn’t work miracles, and the people who had settled here after the war were getting sick and low on the supplies needed for basic living. _Did Bloodhound manage to find cover from the firefight?_ That kid would need another vaccine that she just didn’t have access to. How was she supposed to get it? _Do they have any syringes on them? Shield batteries?_ There was an outbreak of dysentery in the county over, did she have enough supplies and manpower to help? _How many other squads are left?_ Her thoughts rocked back and forth, disorienting her as her mind pulled in two entirely different directions.  
        She flipped off the crackling radio to quell the unwelcome rumination and she got back to work. Guilt gnawed at her stomach like a beast—her worry for the Frontier Corps and its people was suddenly secondary.  
        Regardless, she was able to stay busy for the week through. It occurred to her suddenly, during a routine wellness check, that the game might be nearly over if it hadn’t ended already. The temptation to know mounted until she went to the radio to flip it on again. The words were too muddled for her to understand, however, and so she promised herself to check the news during her break.  
        She was eager, counting the minutes until finally her lunch would arrive and she could sit back and see how Bloodhound was doing. The last she’d heard from among the people she worked with was that there was another sticky firefight between a few of the last ten squads, and she didn’t know if they were involved. She hadn’t asked at the time, despite being intensely curious. Now, hopefully she would have her answer.  
        The headlines that greeted her were like a glass of ice water down the back of her neck. _APEX GAMES TAKING LONG HIATUS: NEXT FOUR SCHEDULED GAMES CANCELED_. She stared in shock at the article, dated only an hour prior. What could that mean? No more games? Were they renovating the island or revamping the mainframe? It couldn’t be something bad...could it? Her heart jumped to her throat and she quickly searched the document for Bloodhound.  
        “After the shocking first ever loss by the resident Apex Champion, Bloodhound, the proprietor of the Apex Games has gone on record as saying the next four games are to be canceled for unspecified reasons. When asked what this meant for the future of the Apex Games, Kuben Blisk was only willing to say ‘The Games are far from gone. They’ll be back. I’ll be back.’ Unable to specify when, however, Blisk instead turned the conversation to…”  
        She read the passage again and again. Each word was like its own separate shock. Not only were the games shutting down for some amount of time, but Bloodhound lost the last one. What happened? How could they possibly have lost? She backed out of that article and searched up Bloodhound’s name on the entirety of the news site. Hit after hit, she sorted by date and quickly picked out one titled “UNEXPECTED LOSS BY PEAK APEX CHAMPION.”  
        There weren’t a lot of details, however. Bloodhound’s squad had been one of the last two, had met in Skulltown for the final fight, and Bloodhound had apparently lost a one on one with another, lesser known player. The girl was ecstatic to have the win and gained rapid fame for defeating the hunter. The article dissolved into detailing her story, and Ajay couldn’t keep reading.  
        Setting the device aside and finally remembering she was supposed to be eating, she picked up the food that had cooled off in her absence. But...she wasn’t hungry. Confused. About Bloodhound, yes, but the games too. What would she do? She was a primary contributor to the Frontier Corps and its cause. How would she get the money to them now? What would happen to the charity if it was forced to close down the Yuma branch—or worse, in its entirety? And the people of the Frontier if that were to pass? She could hardly imagine it, but the implications were steep.  
        She could feel a lot of thoughts she didn’t want to entertain start to creep up in her mind like a plague. But no matter what she did, who she called in to examine or treat, she couldn’t shake them. _How do I keep these people alive if things start to fall apart? What will the Frontier Corps do when they’re already making rollbacks? Is Bloodhound okay?_  
        She found answers to none of these questions among the sick, but she worked tirelessly on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As warned, a shorter chapter. The next few might follow suit, we'll have to see. The actual story will hopefully begin to take shape rather soon. I really enjoyed writing this one, though. Exploring the other side of Ajay is a lot of fun. Thanks for reading! :)


	7. Frontier Corps

        Ajay had no idea how much the games meant to the general populace.  
        She’d been called in to the Corps’ most recent headquarters to make her case for the supplies she’d been asking for. The budget just wasn’t there, and the Corps council had apparently adopted a new tac of demanding any request that cost above a certain amount be approved directly through them. So instead of the branch manager she was generally able to go through, she had to take a jump-trip to another system altogether in order to show the numbers of the sick and infected and explain why she needed what she needed. Because apparently she could be doing something fraudulent with IV fluid, laxatives, and low-grade pain relievers.  
        It was a frustrating endeavor that she didn’t want to be a part of. The journey between jumps would be horrendous. She’d have nothing to do but hope they weren’t accosted by bandits and get lost in her own mind otherwise. Then again, maybe fending off some bandits would keep her from thinking too much…  
        Relief didn’t come, however. Stuck with her thoughts on a boring flight, she kept close tabs on the situation with the Apex Games—but the stories were growing stale and repetitive. There was simply nothing new for them to report. Whatever Blisk insisted he was working on was being kept in hush, and none of the Legends had anything meaningful to add to the conversation. She would search hopefully for an interview with the recently defeated champion, but of course would come up empty. Bloodhound didn’t do interviews when they won, why would they bother when they lost?  
        Once the ship had touched down, she was able to breathe easier. Now she had a mission to complete. Turning her mind to the task at hand, she pulled out her tablet as she walked to go over the numbers and what she would say. Why they needed relief there more than other places. But worry formed like a block of ice in her stomach—a gnawing threat that the interview might turn sour. Would they bring up the closing of the games? Would they ask her how she planned to provide in the future? And what would she say if they did?  
        Truthfully, she didn’t know. She’d have to be honest with them and promise she would still do all she could outside of the games. But the money was the issue at the end of it all, and now she had no viable way of getting any. That thought brought her wandering fingers back to various news sites, trying to find anything new or hopeful to report. She came up as empty as ever.  
        The tension in her shoulders mounted as she ascended the building the Corps was working out of, passing people by as they bustled to and fro in what was looking like increasingly hopeless and frantic attempts to provide aid throughout the dessicated Frontier. She hated coming here on a good day for that, let alone to beg for more money from empty pockets. But as she stepped out onto her floor and made her way toward the meeting she was scheduled for, she knew she would just have to suck it up and do her best.  
        The council welcomed her back with strained smiles, but she supposed that would be the most they could muster in any event. The room was small, some old IMC conference room, and the eight members of the council had arranged themselves in a circular pattern around the table, a gap left for herself. She thanked them for meeting with her and took her seat.  
        While speaking, she was given a plethora of understanding nods and gestures for her to continue, but she could read the doubt in their eyes as she described what she had seen. Her numbers were massive as far as ratios went, but the general population of the Yuma system was lacking. There were other systems throughout the frontier with so many more people—so despite the fact that well over half of Yuma was in need of vaccinations, antibiotics, vitamins, or some combination of the three, it looked bleak when they were only a few million strong and other systems boasted over ten billion.  
        She was doing all she could, explaining the potential of the Yuma’s few planets that were still viable for more life. The Corps had a branch dedicated to relocating people still on planets nearly uninhabitable after the war, surely they could move a billion or so to Yuma? But the budget wasn’t there, either. She was starting to get angry, and it was hard to hide it. “So where _is_ the budget den?”  
        There were a few responses all at once about the vast relief efforts in the Demeter system and so on. The logical part of her understood why things were portioned this way, but she was hurting for the people she saw in the day to day. She kept pushing, though she knew she was in a losing battle.  
        It was in the last dredges of her fight that the room’s comms buzzed. With the press of a button, the head of the council answered. “We are in a meeting, this had better be important.”  
        “There’s an uproar in the nearby settlement,” came a quaking, panicked voice through the intercom. “They’re moving south, and fast. They’ll be here. They have weapons—they’re burning buildings—we don’t know what’s got them so upset, but we need all hands on deck or—”  
        A worried glance made its way down the line as the head released the button, cutting the panicked voice off sharply, and she returned it. A riot? What could have caused that? The murmur that started among the Corps executives made it clear they had as little a clue as she did. “I’m sorry, Ajay, but we—”  
        She nodded. “I wanna help. We can talk about it later.” Whatever was happening, she was sure people were getting hurt over it. So she knew she had to be there.  
        She rushed down the stairs to join the people amassing supplies to help. Already the Corps was mobilizing strike teams to try and dissuade the rioters with nonlethal methods of force, but she had no desire to be a part of that. She joined the medical squads that were readying to go out and follow the path of destruction, tending to the wounded the mob would leave behind. She regretted leaving DOC in Yuma—he would have been a valuable asset.  
        They took near-ancient helicopters into the city where the riot began, and it looked devastated. Her heart dropped to her stomach at the sheer amount of damage that had amassed in such little time. Police forces were still scrambling about to ensure things had calmed in the area when she touched down, shouting and gesturing madly, but she paid them no mind. There were injured around her, and she went to the first she could see to start triage.  
        The task was a great one. Even with the vast numbers the Corps was able to send out immediately, they were outnumbered by the injured four to one at best. She had her work cut out for her, and her mind lost connection with any worries she had been carrying previously. She needed to help.  
        She lost herself there for days at a time. She only stopped to eat or sleep, and was otherwise working tirelessly to provide relief. The riots turned out to be wider spread than initially thought—the people of the Frontier were downright miserable, and their tensions had finally burst. But why? She sat in on only one meeting trying to find the answer to that question, but couldn’t take what they’d come up with—the people were bored. The games were gone and there was no word on them returning. Without the promise of a distraction from his day-to-day life, the everyman of the Frontier grew restless and angry.  
        How could she blame them? She knew as well as they how bleak things were here. Yes, they were rebuilding, but the poverty was enormous. The only charity involved in actually helping them was digging itself an early grave trying to find the funds to do so. Rich pardoned war veterans like Blisk and her parents lived lush lives on the edges of the Frontier, passing money between themselves without any trickle down. Sponsoring the games had been the one thing those people had done right by the common folk, who needed them to go on living the lives they were forced into.  
        But now that rug had been pulled out from under them. She could hear it, even after the board meeting. People would ask her endlessly for news on the games. Those that recognized her begged her to recount tales from her time on the island. It made her miserable every time, to be reminded of the bloodsport she had such a love-hate relationship with, but she did. If it got them to accept her help without fidgeting and complaining, she relived it all as best as she could remember.  
        She was so tired. By the end of a full day of triage and relief, she was ready to drop. She could barely make it to the bed set out for her in a mostly-intact community center before falling asleep. She rarely managed to shower or take care of herself, which hardly helped the tension building. When the people supposed to be helping don’t even look like they can help themselves, why would anyone trust them? That was the sentiment she saw in the eyes of most everyone she came across, and she just had no more answers to give them.  
        It was two long weeks of rioting before the populace calmed. The whole area had been pulled apart by the angry people within it, and she felt like they were chipping at a mountain with a dinner spoon. But she chipped away regardless, because each person helped was something she could feel better about. Less guilty about.  
        The stress of the money was getting to her as well. The stockpiles at the Frontier Corps’ nearest warehouse were wearing thin as the riots raged. The end of them was a relief to nearly everyone as some supplies were spared. But not many. Not enough.  
         _How do I get the money for this to keep up?_ She checked the games every day. Whenever someone asked her to, and whenever she had a free moment alone. But still there was no word. Not for another month as she provided aid.  
        Then her phone rang. She’d nearly forgotten she had the thing, as all communication among the relief team was done on close-range comms. Any other signal, thanks to the destruction of the closest relay beacon during the riots, would have been too weak to come through. But the voice on the end came through nice and clear—transmitted by one of the satellites still working in the system. That meant whoever had the ability to call on that signal had money enough to afford it.  
        She quickly answered, though she wasn’t sure why. She didn’t imagine there would be any good news coming for her now. “Hello?”  
        “No time to talk,” it was Blisk’s voice. She recognized it clear as day, and she bolted up from where she’d been sitting, her heart leaping to her throat in hope. “But the games are back on, girl. You’re invited. New and improved, double or nothing. You in?”  
        How could she refuse that?


	8. Headquarters

        The Apex Headquarters was an immense structure. A huge metal spire jutting from a cliff face on another, rockier island just minimally smaller than Kings Canyon, the building was always a rather unpleasant sight to her. Banners of the Apex logo flew high here, though no one but the players come to join the games and the employees come to run them would ever see the decor. It was always weird to her that they were being flown at all. Especially now—even more were up, emblazoned with various legends and their statistics. She could see herself up there, kills numbering in the hundreds. What was the point?  
        The staffing there was a sight to behold as well—a disconcerting one. Armored guards patrolled the area in droves. Had the riots gotten here, too? How? She didn’t think any settlements were nearby this far into the Outlands, but she truthfully didn’t know the area well enough. As it was, she was sure Blisk had plenty of death threats floating about due to closing the games. She’d seen first hand how upset people were over it.  
        She was ushered in off her ship to a room. Nothing much better than the ones she detoxed in after each game, but a bathroom adjoined. _Will I be staying here for a while?_ Blisk had been honest when he said he had no time to talk—she’d received no further communication besides a message with coordinates for her pickup and a date and time to be ready. Otherwise she was entirely in the dark about the new games ahead of her, and her stomach was twisting now with concern. The only thing keeping her from going crazy with her musings about what was to come was the immense prize money being offered this time around.  
        Standing alone in the quarters she was given, she found it hard to relax. She took DOC out and booted him up to watch the drone zip about the room, inspecting the area they were in. He provided a small distraction—she patted his metallic casing lovingly as he settled himself on her bed—but her questions wouldn’t be quashed so easily. She’d never been here to stay for any amount of time other than during the games—what was the purpose of this? What was she waiting for?  
        The only outside contact, aside from surfing the web on her holopad, was a meal brought to her. Even the person bringing her the food was armed, and she gave them a dubious look as they left the tray on the nightstand beside her. If the games were back on, why did Blisk still need protection? Or had he not announced it yet?  
        It seemed the latter was the case, as she found not a peep of the games from any news source. _Why?_  
        Two days passed with her sequestered from the outside world with only occasional contact with anyone else. A particularly talkative armed lunch-lady offered her a small explanation—she was being kept here to avoid the press, as Blisk was going to stealth-drop his new and improved game for increased ratings. That was all she got, and it left her wanting.  
        Still, it was enough to quiet her down. She took the time to check on the Corps as best she could through the news that followed them—no real responses were given to her personal messages about Yuma or the riot relief. She didn’t know if she really _wanted_ the answers to her questions, anyway, and so she didn’t dig too deeply into it. She didn’t need to hear that the riots had gotten worse or that Yuma’s funding had been cut—not now. She needed to focus if she was going back to the island.  
        Finally the silence was broken. “Gear up as you usually do,” was the terse command from an armed guard, waiting outside. “Then follow.” She sighed in relief at the break in routine, gathered her things, powered DOC down and put him into his pack, snapped on a comforting pair of gloves, then went outside. She rubbed the familiar latex between her fingers to keep the pre-game anxiety at bay as she followed the armor-clad android down the twisting hallways into a large auditorium.  
        There were sixty seats set out in the middle, but none of the current occupants of the room had taken them. Milling about and speaking to one another, she recognized many faces easily. Wraith, Makoa, Bangalore, the android. What were they all doing here? Trepidation seized her like a large hand around her chest, squeezing. Were they all going to take part in the games, too? She had to _win_ to provide money to the Corps, after all. She didn’t feel confident as she found face after face of repeat champion. A nagging thought came upon her then—where’s the one she’s been so curious about all this time? She had figured in a room like this, Bloodhound would stand out. But the hunter was nowhere for her to see.  
        There was a metal-grated walkway with a large set of doors just above, and sound from there brought her eyes up. Blisk. “Welcome, friends! Legends!” He stretched his arms out in a gesture of greeting as he burst through the double doors, grinning down. His stance was full of excitement as he swaggered forward.  
        She looked about herself to see the other legends cheering in response, and to examine the room as unease started to creep up her spine. A large bay door sat to Blisk’s side with an attached platform. Lights flashed just behind it. What could that be, lighting up like an airstrip?  
        The doors opened behind Blisk, loudly, breaking her from her thoughts. A woman came out beside him, clad in a stark white suit that nearly made her blend into the walls behind her. Her hair was short and her eyes were keen as they flashed skeptically over the crowd below. “And welcome,” Blisk continued, grabbing one of her hands to bow and kiss, “my lovely guest. I think you will be quite pleased with what I’m about to say.”  
        She recognized the woman, vaguely, but she couldn’t put her finger on where from. She wracked her mind for it, but the fear snaking down her spine and pooling in her stomach kept her from thinking clearly. What was going on? She hated that she didn’t know, and she hated that it made her skin crawl even more.  
        Again the Apex Predator turned to address the eager crowd at his feet. “My lovely, lovely legends. All of you understand the way of things. Kill or be killed. That’s how the games worked, isn’t it? And did the games work!” He laughed boisterously to punctuate his point, and a few hearty laughs drifted up in kind from the crowd.  
        “It was far too bad about the games closing, wouldn’t you say?” There was a general murmur of consensus as the cheers died. She looked around to see people she recognized nodding and humming in agreement. She didn’t partake, but she would agree, having seen all she had. “The people need you. I need you! To kill and, if someone better comes along, to be killed!” he laughed again, jovially, like he was addressing a group of friends. The crowd laughed as well. She couldn’t muster it.  
        “Well, let’s see how committed you are to the idea, shall we?” The doors shut, then. She heard them lock and bolt behind her, and she turned to see the armed guards move in a row to block it bodily. Ice shot through her veins, her heart thrumming in her ears, distorting the words. They were trapped.  
        “The games...they stopped working! They were fun, sure, but they weren’t what they promised themselves to be, now were they? You all survived time and time again. Won over and over and over. And did you feel the same way about the games your thirtieth time as your first?” The mercenary clucked his tongue and began to pace back and forth on the platform overlooking them, his tone morphing into one of disappointment. Like a teacher giving a lecture to a bunch of misbehaving students; she felt so small down here below him.  
        “No! Of course you didn’t! And why would you? You die and you wake back up. You enter the games again like nothing ever happened! How boring! The games just weren’t doing what they were supposed to be doing!” He gave an exasperated sigh and leaned forward on the railing in front of him. His eyes were wide with enthusiasm, mouth broken in two by the size of his predatory smile. “And so that changes today, my legends! You’ll be the first to pioneer the newest generation of the Apex Games—you’ll be playing them as they were meant to be played! Your own bodies, your own lives down on those islands. Winners take all, and losers…” He tsked.  
        “Well, just don’t be a loser.”  
        The woman was smiling now. Blisk turned to her as whispering started through the crowd—she could hear people asking if this was a joke or a publicity stunt. What this meant and if he was talking about right now. A few sounded excited, but most confused. She was just rooted to the spot, unable to speak as people nudged her and asked questions. Her eyes traced some of the familiar faces around her.  
        Makoa spotted her in return, his face holding none of its usual joviality. He was talking to someone nearby him, someone she didn’t recognize by name, but he looked just as grave. Her eyes flashed to Bangalore—she couldn’t remember the woman’s real name. She looked as stern as usual, eyes up on the platform. Her stance, however, was tense. Even she was not at ease in these circumstances. The holo-scientist Elliott caught her eye then. He was laughing; the laugh sounded forced and uncertain. It wavered.  
        Still she couldn’t see them. She tried to find them in the crowd but they simply weren’t in her sights. She was almost starting to feel relieved to think they weren’t there at all. She turned her gaze back to the grated platform above, seeing that Blisk had descended into a quiet conversation with his guest. She pushed forward hoping to hear. She could, but just barely.  
        “—the returns will be so much more than before, I promise you. People love killing. Real killing.” Blisk sounded proud of himself, grinning at his guest that was so damn _familiar_ if she could just _think_ of where she saw her before.  
        “This is great,” the woman replied. “I didn’t think you had it in you to make up for my losses on the last one.”  
        “So? Do you have it?”  
        “Yes, it’s here…” she paused, looking down as she procured a device from her pocket. She tapped on it a few times and grinned. “These are record numbers. The game hasn’t even started yet. The hiatus was a fantastic idea.”  
        The mercenary snorted. “Idea? You forced me into it and you know that.”  
        “Well, that hardly matters now, does it?”  
        Blisk answered with a shrug, stepping closer to her. “Whatever. I think I earned what I was promised.”  
        “It’s yours. I’ll call off the observation—you deserve it.” Pressing another few buttons on her device, the mysterious bay doors opened behind her. They rose quickly, revealing something that made Ajay’s stomach churn with horror.  
        In the last stages of powering up, a huge, red-plated titan took such a momentous step forward that it shook the platform below it. The force of just one movement from the beast made the walls and floor around the increasingly uneasy crowd vibrate. She watched its optical sensor scan the room before settling on Blisk, her body growing cold as it drew closer. She wasn’t sure she would be able to stay upright for very much longer. It slowly lowered a great hand to a foot above the floor, outstretched like a small staircase. Its cockpit opened with a heavy hiss that echoed in the now silent room.  
        The aged mercenary stepped up onto the outstretched limb and, as the titan lifted him effortlessly up to the pilot’s chair within itself, he looked down to the crowd below him as if they were afterthoughts—smiling all the while. The double doors clattered as the woman took her leave. Ajay’s head was swimming. She felt the need to look below her to ensure her feet were still on the ground at all.  
        “Well, Legends. Seems I got some work to do. You lot have fun killing! I sure will.” With a small hop over the chassis of the titan, he seated himself inside and gave them a short wave. The titan dropped the door to the cockpit and, with one last impassive swipe of its eye over them, turned quickly to exit the way it came. The bay doors clambered down behind its retreating form, the only sound in the room aside from the last living breaths of a group of fifty-seven people.  
        Chaos broke out. People were scrambling this way and that—calling for teams. Squads formed amidst frantic questioning. Is this really happening? Is this a joke? Where did Blisk go? Is anyone looking for a third? Am I going to die? They became a high-pitched whine in her ears as they continued shouting.  
        She felt faint as the armed guards began to step forward, their perimeter around the room tightening and forcing the recurring legends to step closer and closer together. Bodies were shoved into hers, elbows and knees hitting and kicking her as people moved this way and that. She couldn’t lift her legs. Her mind was racing. _That slimy bastard._ It was the most prominent thought among them all.  
        A warm hand found her wrist.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another twofer! I'm excited to be nearly done with this transitional period and back to writing the games and exploring a bit deeper with (gasp) more characters than just the two we've seen so far! Speaking of characters, I suppose I should clarify now: this story was conceptualized and created pre-season 1 and pre-Octane. While I may add him in (he's quickly taken up a lot of my playtime, he's such a good character what the hell) there's no guarantee of that or any ensuing characters (hoping they drop Wattson this/next month!) making an appearance here. (Speaking of hoping for things, hoping the no-regs on Pathfinder get fixed pretty soon. That bothering anyone else?)
> 
> Thanks for reading! :)


	9. Thunderdome

        Makoa. She recognized the face staring back down at her immediately, though it took another few moments for her racing heart to calm and her struggles to still. “C’mon, brudda,” his voice was comforting, but only just. She could hear the strain behind it, the forced calm. “You and me, we got this.”  
        She nodded vaguely, finding it hard to push words through her dry throat. Impossible, even, as she made the attempt again. The room was heating fast with the swiftly growing outcry and the swiftly shrinking proximity between her and everyone else. They were being herded out the doors that were previously blocked off by the guards now surrounding them. She searched desperately for a way to escape, but an opportunity never presented itself.  
        She felt an immense shame with herself for not doing something. Saying something. Starting... _something_. Some movement, a riot, an uproar. For not grabbing for one of the many energy weapons turned on them and firing back; for not buying time for the others to escape and alert someone of this treachery. But...she didn’t. She didn’t have the chance, or maybe she did and she was too afraid to take it.  
        Whatever the case, it seemed only seconds between Blisk’s dramatic exit and the mechanical hiss of the door to the all-too-familiar drop-ship slipping shut and locking. An automated message came over the comms promising them they would be ready to drop on the island in five minutes. _So little time._  
        Makoa was by her side, but they’d as of that moment not found a third and not spoken further. He didn’t seem too intent on seeking anyone else out, and she felt a strange mixture of appreciated and pitied. He was a protector, honorable in that sense, and she couldn’t shake the feeling he’d sniffed out her vulnerability in that auditorium and found his way to her out of worry.  
        People were beginning to calm, if she could call it that. There was certainly no tranquility or ease among the sixty occupants of the ship—but they were growing quiet, an air of heavy acceptance settling over the crowd. While normally they would be seated in long rows, strapped in on either side of the large center port where they would then drop from, now each legend stood about restlessly as their seats were taken by guards holding weapons pointed at their chests. The sight of the ship so full and so tense was foreign and disconcerting.  
        The chime for one minute until viable drop sounded, making her heart pound into her ears again. She looked up at Makoa, searching his face for something—she didn’t know what. There was a process here, a protocol, but she couldn’t remember it. The knowledge of discussing where to drop, who would loot where, and the rotation path they would take after—it was all gone from her. She felt, in that moment, as clueless as that boy she’d dropped with all that time ago.  
        And with that thought, her mind turned to Bloodhound again. She still hadn’t seen them, and the relief she felt was immense and two-fold. On one hand, she wouldn’t have to face off against them in the ring. Having seen the warpath they could create just on their own, she was grateful her chances were even slightly increased with their absence. And on the other...she didn’t have to worry about them.  
        Another loud chime broke her from her thoughts, and teams began dropping. Already formed squads of three jumped out into the whistling air below, and she watched their contrails grow long as their bodies disappeared within the dusty sands. She didn’t have the presence of mind when they first dropped to have a good look at who went where, and she cursed herself for it.  
        Unformed squads lingered in the ship, she and Makoa included. She looked to him in worry, wondering what they would do for their missing third. She didn’t have the chance to ask, however, as she spotted a guard dragging a familiar android behind him. “Here,” he said gruffly, pulling Pathfinder up to stand beside Makoa—she’d never been this close to the robot before, and she marveled at how tall he was. He bounced back and forth on his long legs, seeming unbothered by his grim surroundings. Perhaps that was a perk to not being truly alive. Maybe he would survive this in any event, good or bad. “This is your third. Now _drop_.”  
        Makoa took the news with a stony face, and she didn’t have the willpower to fight the decision. “Hello friends! Don’t worry, I won’t let you down! Except by falling!” The robot activated his boosters and, as they wound up, attached breakable tethers to her and Makoa’s own jump kits. Watching his nimble metallic fingers work distracted her from the inevitability of what they were about to do.  
        Stepping up to the portal, hissing with the air whipping past at the high speed of the drop-ship, she looked down and examined the island below. It looked richly colored, pretty, and not at all like the cemetery it would soon become. She slipped her toe over the edge, feeling her boot begin to drag from the air pressure outside. “Let’s go!” Pathfinder shouted enthusiastically, his chest lighting up with his signature smile.  
        She was grateful her body felt strong. She was able to launch herself easily from the port, holding tight to her tether as Pathfinder glided them expertly in a path to...somewhere. She squinted her eyes against the harsh winds as they plummeted further down. Thunderdome. The broken structure lurked just below them. As it grew in size, so too did the lump in her throat.  
        She broke from the robot’s path once they were roughly one hundred meters above land, veering off toward the broken metal boxes on the northern side of the dessicated arena. Landing on an edge of limestone, she stumbled into a run and scooped up the first gun she could find—a light auto-pistol. Locking the clip into place and pocketing nearby ammo, she looked around herself. A knockdown shield, holo-armor, and in the distance what looked to be a triple-take. She holstered her weapon and turned in that prosperous direction.  
        Her hands found the armor just before another pair. She looked up and met the eyes of someone she realized, with a pit of ice in her stomach, was _not_ a part of her squad. She hastily donned the armor as he stared back at her in mirrored shock and swallowed the lump in her throat down as the reality of her situation set in.  
        He had a gun in his hand, and it was rising to meet her. In past games, she would already be pulling her gun and firing—her muscle memory even forced the pistol out of its holster and into her hands. But the fact of the matter was that this was a person. A living, breathing human being. He wouldn’t just wake up when all was said and done.  
        As he shot a round into her armor, piercing it with a thunderous crack, she was suddenly reminded that _neither would she_.  
        She leveled her RE-45 at him and she fired. The sudden jolt of heat to the barrel and trigger made her latex gloves snap apart, burning her skin. It hurt. In some way, she’d hoped that it would be a more vivid pain. That it would feel more real this time around. That she would have some sort of reminder that this was life or death, far and above what the games used to be. But, to her shame, it felt just as it always did to shoot a man in the head until he fell over.  
        She released the full clip into him, continuing to fire even after he went down. She could feel her eyes stinging with the dry, sandy winds coming in from the west—her chest burned as she heaved in air. Her cheeks were wet, with sweat or tears she didn’t know, but he was still and she was alive. She could feel blood trickling down the inside of her cracked armor, leaking into her shirt and making the fabric heavy. Her own blood, real and warm, coming from a bullet wound that was shockingly numb. She turned away from her handiwork and looked to her allies.  
        Pathfinder had managed himself high up on a metal crate, one she didn’t imagine she could climb, and he was shooting down at someone who was firing back at him. She could tell the android was winning that battle, however, and so she turned her eyes to Makoa. It seemed her friend was even better off, his armor tinted blue and his peacekeeper shot landing with a meaty _thunk_ into an enemy that swiftly dropped into a heap at his feet.  
        A chime blared. First blood. She heard her own name as the announcer made sure to let everyone know who had drawn it, and watching the last of their enemies fall to a resounding shot from Pathfinder’s G-7, she felt sick. She crouched down, leaning on the nearest solid surface as she searched her lungs for air. She’d taken a life. It came tumbling down on her like rocks. She could feel her legs shaking, her heart stuttering an uneven rhythm in her chest.  
        “You all right, brudda?” Makoa’s comforting voice, boisterous and carrying across Thunderdome as he jogged in her direction, only made the bile rise higher in her throat. She could feel her nostrils burning as the need to vomit grew stronger. More than anything, she realized with disgust, she was just grateful that she was alive. Even if that meant he wasn’t.  
        “I’m fine,” she breathed out, finally able to find words. And, perhaps, her footing. She climbed the wall she was leaning on with her hands, hoping to haul herself back to standing—only to find it wasn’t a wall.  
        Dark and cold, inactive and for good reason, she’d been sitting against a respawn beacon. She did retch, then.  
        Her eyes were squeezed shut as she emptied the contents of her stomach into the sand. She could feel the warm hands of Makoa as he held her in place, pulling back a stray bit of hair that fell into her eyes as she did what she had to do. The hydraulic sounds of Pathfinder making his way to them broke through the haze she was in, allowing her to finally stop gagging and wipe her mouth with her sleeve.  
        “Are you okay, friend?” The robot’s optical sensor glanced down to what had once been her breakfast, then to her face. “You seem unwell!”  
        “I’m _fine_ ,” she said again. She had to be. She had seen death before—she was a licensed doctor. But shooting a man down in cold blood before a live audience? It was an entirely different thing to turn around and see, sending a shudder up her spine.  
        As she always did, she knelt down and closed his eyes. She would ensure she honored the dead now. They were wide, still holding his terror. He looked no more than mid-twenties. She herself was twenty-four. She certainly wasn’t ready to die. Was he?  
         _No time for that now._ She took his gun from his hands, the triple-take she’d been eyeing earlier, and holstered her pistol. Not a load-out she was comfortable with, but being uncomfortable was something she was sure she would have to get used to. And fast.  
        Makoa patted her back a few times and she wished she had the energy to turn and thank him for what he was doing. His strength shined through in his small comforts; she needed that now and would likely still need it as time went on. Pathfinder continued to gaze at her for a few moments, a small nurse symbol flashing on his chest. “Would you like me to give you a physical examination?” he offered, his chipper voice lowering an octave in concern. Or maybe a simulation of concern—she didn’t know. She eyed the android warily for a few moments as she stood up and brushed sand from her knees.  
        “No thanks. I’m all right.” That seemed to satisfy her squadmate, who nodded his head and turned away.  
        “I will go scan for the next ring, friends!” he called as he raised his arm high. His grappling hook shot out from his wrist and, effortlessly, he swung himself back up onto the crate he’d just been fighting from. No longer surrounded by her squad, she put herself on autopilot, mirroring Makoa’s movements as she scoured the rest of their surroundings for loot. A backpack, syringes, shield cells. For a while, she could almost forget the situation she was in.  
        The body of the man she killed sat still in the sun, gathering sand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm truly enjoying writing from Lifeline's perspective. Although we only get two paragraphs of her character from Respawn, they offered a lot of chance for depth when it comes to her. I'm a fan of strong, but vulnerable characters. I hope I can do her even a modicum of justice. Thanks for reading! :)


End file.
